Texas reports the first case of Zika that likely came from local mosquitoes

Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen at the Laboratory of
Entomology and Ecology of the Dengue Branch of the U.S. Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention in San Juan, Puerto
Rico.Thomson
Reuters

Texas officials on Monday reported the state's
first case of the Zika virus that was likely transmitted by a
local mosquito, expanding the spread within the continental
United States of a virus that has been linked to microcephaly, a
rare birth defect.

The case involved a woman living in Cameron County near the
Mexico border, the Texas Department of State Health Services
said.

The state said it currently has no other suspected cases of local
transmission, though Texas
has reported 257 confirmed cases that residents got while
traveling to affected areas or from having sex with people who
traveled.

"We knew it was only a matter of time before we saw a Zika case
spread by a mosquito in Texas," DSHS commissioner Dr. John
Hellerstedt said in a statement. "We still don’t believe the
virus will become widespread in Texas, but there could be more
cases, so people need to protect themselves from mosquito bites,
especially in parts of the state that stay relatively warm in the
fall and winter."

Most
people who get Zika have mild symptoms — and many don't even
realize they have the virus — but the disease can cause severe
neurological problems, including Guillain-Barre Syndrome in
adults and microcephaly in fetuses.

While most northern states in the US are protected from local
Zika transmission because the cold kills mosquitoes in the
winter, researchers predict that the virus could be in southern
states like Texas and Florida permanently.

"Every time an imported case comes, you're rolling that dice in
terms of a local outbreak occurring," David Pigott, a global health expert at the
University of Washington, told Business Insider Insider in August
when the
virus started circulating on the US mainland. "I think it
could well be that these [Florida] cases represent the tip of the
iceberg, but I don't know if anyone knows how big that iceberg
could potentially get."